Page 31 of Daddy Knows Best

It couldn't be.

He couldn't be here, at my apartment, seeing what I'd become in one day without his structure. My brain rejected the possibility even as my body recognized that particular rumble, the way he pronounced my middle name like punctuation.

"Open the door." Not a request. A command that bypassed my higher functions and went straight to the part of me that had learned to obey that voice. "Emergency clause, subsection three."

Emergency clause. The words penetrated my panic, dredging up memories of legal documents and careful boundaries. Buried in all those forms I'd signed, something about intervention protocols. Crisis management. The right to breach normal therapeutic boundaries if a client presented imminent danger to themselves.

My hand moved without permission, reaching for the deadbolt. But shame froze me mid-motion. He couldn't see me like this—unwashed, half-dressed, surrounded by evidence of exactly how badly I'd spiraled without him. The Emily he knew sat properly in chairs and tracked receipts. Not this creature in day-old lingerie, marinating in her own poor choices.

"I'm invoking professional duty of care." His voice carried that particular note of authority that made my spine straighten eventhrough the door. "You have thirty seconds before I contact building management."

Building management. Mrs. Myers, who already looked at me like I was three days from eviction. Who'd definitely have opinions about strange men demanding entry to apartments full of wine bottles and financial ruin.

"Emily." Softer now, but no less commanding. "Twenty seconds."

My fingers fumbled with the lock, metal slick under sweaty palms. The deadbolt turned with a click that sounded like judgment. But I couldn't make myself open it further, couldn't face what waited on the other side.

"Ten seconds."

"I'm a mess," I whispered to the door, to him, to myself.

"I know." Something in his voice cracked, just slightly. Human breaking through professional. "Open the door anyway."

Five seconds. Four. Three.

I turned the handle.

The door cracked open just enough to frame him. Rain beaded on his dark hair, caught in his beard like tiny diamonds. The charcoal coat I'd seen through the peephole hung open over a white dress shirt, no tie.

His eyes did a clinical sweep of what he could see through the gap—my smeared face, the lingerie, the war zone of my apartment visible behind me. His expression didn't change, but something tightened in his jaw.

"May I come in?" The formality of the question contrasted with how he'd commanded me to open the door.

I stepped back, pulling the door wider. The full scope of my destruction revealed itself in the gray morning light. Empty bottles reflected like accusations. Papers covered the floor—overdraft notices I'd printed in some masochistic impulse,receipts from my spiral, the crumpled Week Three envelope I'd thrown at the wall.

He stepped inside with careful movements, rain dripping from his coat onto my disaster of a floor. The door clicked shut behind him, sealing us into my shame.

"When did you last eat?" His voice stayed neutral, but his eyes catalogued everything—the lipstick smears on my cheek from sleeping in yesterday's face, the way I swayed slightly on my feet, how my arms wrapped around my middle like I could hold myself together through pressure alone.

"I don't—yesterday? Maybe?" Time had gone liquid since I'd destroyed everything. "Nate, I'm so sorry—"

"Stop." He held up the tablet he'd been carrying, screen already lit. "Apologies later. Facts now."

The screen showed a dashboard I didn't recognize—graphs and numbers and red flags everywhere. My name sat at the top like a diagnosis: CARTER, EMILY M. - RISK ASSESSMENT: CRITICAL.

"Your bank's fraud detection algorithm triggered an alert to my monitoring system at 2:47 this morning." He scrolled through data with practiced efficiency. "Fifteen charges across seven vendors, all flagged as unusual spending patterns. Total attempted damage: $3,726.42."

The number hit like ice water. I'd thought it was bad, but this was catastrophic. "How do you have—"

"Subsection 12-B of your treatment consent. Financial monitoring authorization for high-risk clients." He turned the tablet toward me fully. "Which you became the moment you disclosed pre-existing debt and shopping addiction patterns."

My eyes blurred trying to focus on the screen. But there, in green text that seemed too good to be real: ALL PURCHASES REVERSED. ACCOUNTS FROZEN. FRAUD PROTECTION ACTIVATED.

"I don't understand." My voice came out broken, confused.

"I invoked fiduciary emergency access at 3:15 AM. Contacted each vendor's fraud department, confirmed unauthorized usage pattern, reversed all pending charges." He set the tablet on my coffee table, movements precise among the chaos. "Your accounts are temporarily frozen but solvent. The charges never processed. You're exactly where you were Thursday afternoon—$14.10 remaining, no new debt."

The words didn't compute. No new debt.

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